"Those who dance are considered insane by those who can’t hear the music."

The Seven Spiritual Laws for Parents

For a long time now, I have wanted to incorporate Deepak Chopra’s Seven Spiritual Laws for Parents into our daily life. As with his Seven Spiritual Laws for Success, the book plots the laws and lessons by weekday, so that each day of the week corresponds with a spiritual lesson to work on. I really enjoy his ideas for relating the lessons to kids – each law is put into language that kids can understand, although many of the ideas are still so abstract that parents will only be able to touch on very simplified versions of the ideas.

I think that there is potential to make this a very central part of our homeschooling schedule, with activities ranging from language, to art, to science tying in to the lessons from week to week. I’ve made lists of ideas and will be posting them on the corresponding days next week. These include book and film suggestions that tie in to the lessons.

Importantly, as we go through the spiritual lessons day by day, we, as parents, need to practice the laws as well. For instance, Wednesday is about the Law of Least Effort, when we tell our child, “Don’t say no – go with the flow.” Chopra tells us to accept situations as they occur; take responsibility for our situation; and relinquish the need to defend our point of view. As we have conversations with our children about these themes, we need to be honest with them about our own actions, reactions and feelings, whether we succeeded that day, or in the past, with the lesson, or whether there was a time when we were unable to

I’ll also try to remember, as Neko talks to me about her dreams and feelings, to not be judgmental of the things she comes out with.

Ideally, I would like to make a felt or magnetic weekly calendar, where we could mark which law we’re learning about each day, things like the weather and events or classes, and well… okay I haven’t thought about it much beyond weather and the Seven Spiritual Laws. I’ve tried to find an example of something similar to what I’m thinking but I can’t find anything close! If I make one, I’ll post a photo.

The days are as follows. I’ve listed a few ideas here, though like I said, I’ll be going into more depth over the next week (starting Sunday, Jan. 22) as I post the laws day by day.

Sundayisa day of pure potentiality. The message for today is, “Everything is possible, no matter what.”

Activities for today would centre around meditation, being in nature, and discussing the different possibilities in a particular situation.

Tuesdayis a day of Karma. The message for today is, “When you make a choice, you change the future.”

Today is a day to talk about choices, and how we can choose how to act or react in any situation. This is a great time to talk to your children about how to know whether they’re making the right choice. Activities for today might include talking about choices we’ve made today, and how they affected our lives and those of others.

To be honest, this is the day I’m having the most trouble with, as far as coming up with actual activities, or books. How on earth do you teach a kid about something as abstract and complicated as karma? I would welcome any ideas!

Wednesdayis a day of Least Effort. The message for today is, “Don’t say no—go with the flow.”

Today’s activities focus on finding the game in work or chores; taking responsibility for your actions and reactions; and identifying the work that doesn’t feel like work to you. Some ideas might be floating boats down a stream, wandering without a destination, or engaging in creative pursuits.

Here’s a great example of a vision board from the blog “The Parenting Files.”

Fridayis a day of Detachment. The message for today is, “Enjoy the journey.”

This is a day to let those intentions from yesterday go and allow things to happen the way they’re meant to. I’m trying to gather ideas for some experiments that have unpredictable results to do on this day. This is also a good day to play a board game, enter a contest, and burn or otherwise release the intentions you wrote down on Thursday.

Saturdayis a day of Dharma. The message today is, “You are here for a reason.”

Saturday is about discovering your own talents and skills, and using them to enrich your own life and lives of others. Activities today focus on spending time pursuing your talents, volunteering your time and talents for others, and learning about historical figures who have changed the world with their own unique talents.

I love this! I’m going to have to get myself a copy of this book! We are trying to work these things into life through discussion around the choices we make for our family/our lives, with an underlying current of thankfulness… I think this would put some structure to it!

One book we have… can’t recall the exact title, but it would work… about how we are all carrying around an invisible bucket… and positive things we do fills up our bucket and the person who is getting the compliment/nice gesture… and when we do something negative, both our buckets lose out.